D&D 3E/3.5 [3.5] Paladin's Mount w/Leadership: Is this one legal?

[Sidyan]

Nice story, but it won't fly. To be a Half-Celestial, one of your parents must be a Celestial, not merely a celestial creature. So unless Odif was a overly frisky Hound Archon in disguise, or a Lupinal trying to get back to its roots, Perrigo would be a celestial dog at best, and probably merely a regular dog, as he's not a native of Arcadia, Celestia, Bytopia, Elysium, The Beastlands, Arborea, or Ysgard.

IMHO, that is.

 

[Artoomis]

"Must be a Celestial, not merely a celestial creature..."

Hmmm..... Well, let's look it up and see (I want it to be legal and not completely farfetched):

CELESTIAL CREATURE

Celestial creatures dwell on the upper planes, the realms of good, although they resemble beings found on the Material Plane. They are more regal and more beautiful than their earthly counterparts.

Celestial creatures often come in metallic colors (usually silver, gold, or platinum). They can be mistaken for half-celestials, more powerful creatures that are created when a celestial mates with a non-celestial creature.

CREATING A CELESTIAL CREATURE

“Celestial” is an inherited template that can be added...

Whoo hoo! Looks like it's legal!

 

[Sidyan]

Celestial creatures often come in metallic colors (usually silver, gold, or platinum). They can be mistaken for half-celestials, more powerful creatures that are created when a celestial mates with a non-celestial creature.

I agree with this completely. Note that it states "when a celestial mates", not "when a celestial creature mates". A celestial dog is not a Celestial, and therefore can't beget half-celestial offspring.

The entire issue arises from the faulty "Half-Celestial" name ... WotC should have split it up into Half-Archon, Half-Guardinal, Half-Eladrin, & Half-Angel. Because that's what a Half-Celestial is, not the offspring of just any dog from the Beastlands.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Yes, there's a difference between "a Celestial" and "a celestial creature".

"a Celestial": see the 3E MM, when it was a single entry. In 3.5, it's been split into "Archon", "Ghaele", "Angel", etc. This is a sentient inhabitant of the upper planes. They're not "humans who live on the upper planes" or anything, they're a distinct class of outsider. Note that word: Outsider. They're not humanoids, magical beasts, etc.

"a celestial creature": the analog of a mundane creature who's gained the celestial template by being from an upper plane. In 3E this was supposed to be for animals, vermin, etc., although in 3.5E it was clarified that you can have celestial humanoids (which are NOT the same as Celestials mentioned above). Creature type doesn't change, except that Animals or Vermin become Magical Beasts. They're not outsiders, though.

That is, in the first case "celestial" is a noun, in the second it's an adjective. It's the same as the separation between "fiend" and "fiendish".

To make things easier, read the 3E MM, Half-Celestial template, where it explicitly states that a Half-Celestial is the cross between a Celestial (which, like I said above, was a distinct entry in the non-template part of the MM) and an INTELLIGENT creature. They didn't include this flavor text in the 3.5E SRD, unfortunately, or else this'd be a lot clearer.
Also note that a Half-Celestial is an Outsider, so it can't be a cross between a celestial creature (which, at best, is a magical beast) and a mundane creature.

This has been clarified by WotC several times, but for some reason wasn't put into the FAQ.

So anyway, as to your story, the cross between a celestial riding dog and an awakened mundane dog? By the rules, it'd still just be a normal dog, not even intelligent. After all, the father's INT came only from being a Paladin's mount, not any sort of genetic thing, and the mother's INT came from a spell. MAYBE you could be generous and let the child get the celestial template too, but it wouldn't be any kind of Half-Celestial.
Even if you allowed it to be an intelligent creature, it would probably be like some sort of Planetouched dog. Sort of an Aasimar pet; smaller bonuses than the celestial template, for less ECL.

 

[Artoomis]

Thanks for your input, you are helping me refine Perrigo's background nicely.

You guys are not being unreasonable at all, but the rules HAVE changed for 3.5.

What makes a half-celestial is now defined under the celestial template. Archons are one example of a celestial creature. There is no longer a catagory called "Celestial" seperate from "celestial creatures" in the same way there was in 3E.

It's a new day, folks, and [3.5] changes the rules.

There is still one issue though - in order to be a half-celestial the offspring dog would half to have at least a 3 intellligence, so the rules would have to be stretched just a bit there. It does not seems reasonabke, though, since both parents have above animal-level intelligence (and Odif does from being celestial, not just from being a paladin's mount).

As for the "celestial" part, a Hound Archon could have served as one parent, since they can take any dog form. I just did not really want to go there, since I had a decent story line without it.